Epistle.
2 Corinthians iii. 4-9.

Brethren:
Such confidence we have, through Christ towards God. Not that we are sufficient to think anything of ourselves as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is from God. Who also hath made us fit ministers of the new testament, not in the letter, but in the Spirit. For the letter killeth; but the Spirit giveth life. Now if the ministration of death, engraven with letters upon stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face of Moses, for the glory of his countenance, which is done away: how shall not the ministration of the Spirit be rather in glory? For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, much more the ministration of justice aboundeth in glory.

Gospel.
St. Luke x. 23-37.

At that time:
Jesus said to his disciples: Blessed are the eyes that see the things which you see. For I say to you that many prophets and kings have desired to see the things that you see, and have not seen them: and to hear the things that you hear, and have not heard them. And behold a certain lawyer stood up, tempting him, and saying: Master, what must I do to possess eternal life? But he said to him: What is written in the law? how readest thou? He answering, said: "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind: and thy neighbor as thyself." And he said to him: Thou hast answered right: this do, and thou shalt live. But he, willing to justify himself, said to Jesus: And who is my neighbor? And Jesus answering, said: A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among robbers, who also stripped him, and having wounded him, went away, leaving him half dead. And it happened that a certain priest went down the same way, and seeing him, he passed by. In like manner also a Levite, when he was near the place and saw him, passed by. But a certain Samaritan being on his journey came near him; and seeing him was moved with compassion. And going up to him, bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine: and setting him upon his own beast, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. And the next day he took out two pence, and gave to the host, and said: Take care of him: and whatsoever thou shalt spend over and above, I at my return will repay thee. Which of these three in thy opinion was neighbor to him that fell among the robbers? But he said: He that showed mercy to him. And Jesus said to him: Go and do thou in like manner.

Sermon CXII.

Which of these three in thy opinion
was neighbor to him that fell among the robbers?
But he said: He that showed mercy to him.
And Jesus said to him:
Go and do thou in like manner.
—St. Luke x. 36, 37.

You would not think it a compliment if one should say that you were a bad neighbor, for that would mean that you were quarrelsome and tale-bearing, that you kept late and noisy hours, that you beat the neighbors' children; perhaps that you would steal something, if you got the chance. So none of us would like to be called a bad neighbor. But let us see how good a neighbor we are, using our Blessed Lord's words read to-day as a text.

As we pass along the road of life here and there we see a neighbor lying half dead. He is stricken down with sickness; his body tormented with racking pains, burning with fever, and perhaps deserted by all—not one left to give him a drink of cold water. What kind of a neighbor are we to this poor brother of ours? When we hear him moan and cry, and ask for a bite of nourishing food, for a little money to buy some medicine, does our heart soften towards him, do we kindly assist him, or do we pass on as if we saw him not, hard of heart like the degraded Jewish priest or the self-sufficient Levite?

And we come across many a poor creature who has fallen among the worst kind of thieves—viz., those who have stripped him of his good name. Alas! you are often forced to stand by and see and hear your neighbor deprived of his reputation by scandal-mongers. How do you act in that case? Does your heart burn with sympathy for him? Do you raise your voice in his defence? Do you correct your children when they engage in such talk? Do you turn out of your house those notorious backbiters and tale-bearers of your neighborhood when they begin their poisonous gossip? If you act in this way you are a good neighbor, a good Samaritan to an outraged and dying brother. But if you fail in this—if you hold your peace when you could say a good word of praise or excuse; if you permit those subject to you to talk ill of others; if you let your house be made a gossip-shop—then, by your silence and your consent, you are like the priest and Levite of this day's Gospel. And if you join in backbiting, why you are worse yet; you are yourself a robber of your neighbors dearest possession, his good name.

But O my brethren! what lot so sad as that of the poor wretch who has fallen into the clutches of Satan and his devils, who has been robbed of God's very grace, his soul killed by mortal sin? The ways of life are full of such poor sufferers. Oh! what pity have you for the poor sinner? What prayers do you offer to God for the conversion of the sinner? What warnings and exhortations do you give him, especially if he be dear to you by ties of blood? What example do you set him? I fear that some of us despise the poor sinner, and feel quite too holy to seek him out, to invite him to hear a sermon, to ask him to come and get the pledge, to try and get him into good company.

Brethren, may God give us grace to be good Samaritans; to have a tender heart and a generous hand for Christ's poor and sick and outcast; to have a charitable word for the saving of our neighbor's good name; and, above all, to be always ready to bind up the spiritual wounds of the sinner by our prayers and example, and to pour healing oil upon them by our exhortations!

Rev. Algernon A. Brown.

Sermon CXIII.

There are two opposite faults to both of which almost everybody is more or less inclined. The first of these is meddling with other people's business; the second is shirking one's own.

It is rather the second of these than the first which is rebuked in the Gospel of to-day, in the persons of the priest and the Levite who went by without helping the poor wounded man.

Now, in the first place, let me explain what I mean by shirking one's own business or duties. It is not simply leaving them undone and expecting that they will remain so; but it is putting off what one ought to do one's self on to somebody else, and expecting somebody else to do it for you. So it is, you see, just the opposite of meddling, which is trying to do somebody else's duty for him when he would prefer to do it himself.

Now, this shirking was just what the priest and Levite were guilty of. I do not suppose that our Lord meant to describe them as really hard-hearted men, willing to let the poor man die rather than help him; but they said to themselves, "Oh! this is not my business particularly; there are plenty of other people passing along this road all the time, and I am a little hurried now. I have got a deal to attend to, and there will be somebody coming this way before long. Five minutes or so will not make much difference; and perhaps there is not so much the matter with the man after all. It may be his own fault. Very likely he has been drinking. At any rate, he has got no special claim on me."

This is a very natural state of mind for a person to get into, and how common it is, in such a case as this, we can see from the common proverb that "everybody's business is nobody's business."

There are very many good works that really are everybody's business, that everybody ought to do something towards at least, but which are in great danger of not being done at all on account of this habit of shirking which is so common. And the ones which are most in this danger are those of the kind of which this Gospel gives us an example; that is, works of charity toward our neighbor. People say to themselves, just as the priest and Levite did: "Oh! there are plenty of other people that can attend to this matter a great deal better and easier than I can. I am sure it will be done somehow or other. Such things always are attended to. I don't feel specially called on to help in it."

Well, this might be all very good, if those people did really help in some things generously, and the case before them was one of no very urgent need. Of course we cannot contribute to everything. But the difficulty is that too often we find them shirking, not occasionally, but all the time. If a poor man comes to the door, or a collection is taken for the poor in the church, they say to themselves: "The St. Vincent de Paul Society can look out for those things; I am sure they must have money enough. I shall do my duty if I put a few pennies in the poor-box now and then." If contributions are called for in times of famine or pestilence, they say: "There is plenty coming in to supply all that is wanted; I can see that by the papers. They can get along very well without me." And so it goes all the way through. They do not give anything to anybody or do anything for anybody—that is, nothing to speak of—without getting a return for it. They will go to picnics, fairs, or amusements for a charitable object; but when it comes to doing anything simply for the love of their neighbor, that is left for somebody else.

Let us all, then, my brethren, examine ourselves on this point, and resolve to amend and to do our fair share of the work of charity, which is everybody's business; and not, like the priest and the Levite, pass it on to the next man who comes along.

But he, willing to justify himself,
said to Jesus: And who is my neighbor?
—St. Luke x. 29.

The lawyer of whom the Gospel tells us to-day, my brethren, seems to have wanted to be excused from loving everybody, and to find out just how far the circle of his affections must be extended; or, at least, to get our Lord's opinion on that point. The question which he asked was something like that of St. Peter when he enquired how often he must forgive his brother; though I hardly think the lawyer was as much in earnest as the great Prince of the Apostles to know the answer.

Well, our Saviour, as you see, did not answer the question directly, but told a story which is, or should be, familiar to all of you: the story of the good Samaritan. He made the Samaritan give his judgment on the point, and then approved that judgment.

"Which of these three," he asked of the lawyer after telling him the story, "was neighbor to him that fell among the robbers?" That is, "Which of the three seems to have considered the poor fellow to be his neighbor?" "The Samaritan," replied the lawyer, of course, "because he showed love for him." "Very well, then," said our Lord, "adopt his opinion, for it is the right one. Go and do thou in like manner."

And yet what reason had the Samaritan to consider this man to be his neighbor? He must naturally have supposed him to be a Jew, finding him so near to Jerusalem; and the Samaritans had no very neighborly feeling toward the Jews. The Samaritans and Jews were, in fact, very much like cats and dogs to each other. You may read in the chapter of the Gospel just preceding this how the inhabitants of a certain place in Samaria would not let our Lord into it, simply because he seemed to be going to Jerusalem; and in another of the towns of the Samaritans a woman thought it strange that our Lord, being a Jew, should even presume to ask her for a drink of water. And though this was a good Samaritan who was passing over that road between Jerusalem and Jericho, still he must have had some of the feelings of his people.

The reason why the good Samaritan considered the man his neighbor is, then, plain enough. If he regarded a Jew as his neighbor it was because he regarded every one as such. That was the judgment of his which our Divine Lord approved. Let there be no limit to your charity. Love every one; that is the meaning of his command, just as he told St. Peter to forgive any number of times.

But how few there are who obey this law of his! Some only care for their relations or acquaintances, and regard the rest of the world with the most supreme indifference. Others, on the contrary, live in a perpetual quarrel with almost every one whom they know, though very willing to be friendly with strangers. Others stop at the limit of their own nation or race; a man who is so unfortunate as to speak a foreign language or have a skin somewhat darkly colored is quite beyond the reach of their benevolence.

It is plain enough that this is all wrong. If we would be like our Lord, and do as he commands, we must get over all these feelings. Above all, we must sink for ever out of sight those hateful standing quarrels which are more after the devil's own heart than anything else which he finds in this world; we must drop at once all that humbug about not wishing any harm to Mr. and Mrs. So-and-so, but being never going to speak to them again. It is not enough to wish no harm to any one; we must wish good to every one, and try to do every one all the good that comes in our way; make up our minds to feel kindly to every one, and to show every one that we are willing and anxious to act as we feel. Of course there must be degrees in affection; we are not required to love every one as much as a father or mother, or a son or a daughter; but that no one must be excluded from it; that we must have a positive love for all; that it will not do even to pass by with indifference a single one of our brethren, however seemingly estranged from us—this is the lesson taught us by the parable of the priest, the Levite, and the good Samaritan.